A student of the Novosibirsk State Technical University, (NETI), is working on creating an application for designing tourist routes. The traveler only needs to choose a city and points of interest to visit, and the program will automatically create the desired route and accompany the walk with clear and detailed cards with information about each attraction.
"There is no universal application on the Russian market that would help tourists comfortably explore new places: booking applications are presented separately, you need to build a route yourself, you have to search for information on the go on the Internet. Many people find it inconvenient to buy tours or crowded excursions. The Ugolki app will allow the traveler to explore the city comfortably on their own. The functionality of the application includes automatic route selection and navigation around the city, an interactive map, tourist cards with information about each attraction," Diana Demina, a 2nd year student of the Faculty of Automation and Computer Engineering of NSTU-NETI, shared her idea.
The user's path is quite simple: just download the application, select the desired city, mark the places of interest and go on an independent tour. A separate important feature will be the ability to leave your "travel notes" — reviews and impressions that will be visible to other users. Also, everyone will be able to recommend their favorite place to visit in any city — just fill out an application and pass moderation. In the future, the creation of a recommendation algorithm that will save time on searching for attractions for a particular tourist, selecting locations based on his previous decisions.
The mission of the developer is to show how diverse and interesting the corners of our Homeland are, thereby increasing the level of public interest in domestic tourism.
At the moment, the application is implemented in a test format using the example of Novosibirsk: some of the city's attractions have already been added. The cities of Siberia and the Far East will be the first to appear on interactive maps. It is planned that the application will be available for Russian users in March 2025.
"The application will really be relevant, as this practice is common in many cities around the world and is encouraged by tourists. For example, for trips to nearby cities that are available for trips in the "City break" format (a short weekend in a new city), this will be very relevant. I recommend that students consider this holiday format for summer holidays. A night on the train and you are in Omsk or Krasnoyarsk, which are becoming more interesting every year: excursions, gastronomy, new tourist infrastructure, beautiful spaces, events; neighboring Tomsk, which is also developing as a tourist city before our eyes. A little further — Perm and Yekaterinburg. And the ancient cities of Central Russia. In general, I would advise you to explore our country yourself, because in every city there is something to see and be surprised at, and the tourist infrastructure, events, events are constantly developing," commented Elena Vorotnikova, senior lecturer at the Department of Marketing and Service of NSTU-NETI.